Universities no longer communities, but rather capitalistic corporations

Public state universities have lost their role as an inter-connected community and has become a capitalistic business venture that can only be restored by CSUS faculty said Professor Jeffrey Lustig. He said that universities have strayed away from teaching students to be part of the public and now trains them to be prospective employees.

“It's besieged not just by the disinvestment in higher education, but by institutional trends and theories within the universities themselves,” Lustig said. “They have presented us with difficult predicaments in the classroom and they also pose a danger to society.”

Most of the conflicts in universities today are due to the clash between two different visions of higher education and its functions said Lustig. He said that the older vision combined the personal, political and professional purposes. The new vision responds to what prospective employers want from the students he said.

“The faculty was meant to be part of a community that is free to evaluate everything, concern itself with the truth and speak reason - publicly,” he said. The new model has turned the university into a business Lustig said.

“The constitution says that the legislature should encourage intellectual improvement because it is essential to the rights and liberties of people,” he said. It is not to do career training or boost the state's GDP said Lustig.

Today, the university is seen as a place for capital accumulation he said. In a real community, no administrator would take a raise while the salaries of those who were fulfilling the requirements were being cut he said.

Lustig said that misconstruing students as customers proposes a drastic narrowing of obligation between teachers and students.

“The new message would be you are what you buy,” said Lustig. This privatization has given our state the lowest adult literacy rate of any state in the union he said. He said it has reversed the progress we made towards racial and ethnic equality.

“I hope our stand is against this new business model and mission,” said Lustig.

“It is essentially the job of the faculty to bring us back to the older model,” he said. This means to be active off campus as much as being active on campus Lustig said.

“The faculty has remained indecisive and mostly silent. That silence needs to end,” he said. “We need to be activist professionals or we'll cease to be professionals at all.”

Lustig spoke today to students and faculty gathered in the University Ballroom during the John C. Livingston Annual Faculty Lecture. The lecture honors CSUS faculty who have played an active role in the life of the University. Professor Livingston was a professor of Government at CSUS from 1954 to 1981 and the first recipient of the honorary lecture. Lustig is currently the professor emeritus of the Government department at CSUS.

Foreclosures leaving homeowners depressed and suicidal

With nearly 13,000 homes in Sacramento in foreclosure or pre-foreclosure status, homeowners are walking away depressed and empty. Homeowners are psychologically scathed said Realtor Gena Riede.

“By the time these people are in foreclosure, they have withdrawn from everyone,” said Riede. “The realtors, lawyers, and even the banks are not talking to them.”

She said that there are many reasons why people go into foreclosure. Due to loss of their spouse or divorce, they end up having to support a household on one income said Riede. “They can’t afford their homes, so they lose them to the banks,” she said.

“Sometimes their house has depreciated in value and so the owner files for bankruptcy, foreclosing on their home,” Riede said. She said that the best thing for people who cannot afford their homes is to file for bankruptcy.

“Usually, these people are getting nasty calls from creditors because they’re also late on other bills as well,” said Riede. “People feel very naked and don’t really want to talk to anyone about their situation.”

“The government has created all these programs that supposedly help homeowners, but they’re not working,” said Jeff Silver of Stanford Mortgage. People are still foreclosing on their homes while the banks are getting the true bailouts he said.

"Very little assistance trickles down to homeowners from the government," said Silver. Riede said that the people going through foreclosure feel like they are being robbed of their dignity because they have to leave their homes because of the financial crisis.

“It’s a real tough thing for them to go through,” said Riede. Homeowner Zubia Amir said that she and her kids didn’t have any place to go except sleep in the car.

“We had our clothes in the trunk and food in the backseat,” said Amir. “I felt suicidal, almost as if I didn’t deserve my children because I wasn’t able to provide them with a home.”

Amir fell behind on her payments when her husband suddenly left her with a house payment and credit card payments she said. Since then, she has settled down with extended family until she can afford an apartment.

Riede said that she thinks the only solution to the foreclosures is for the government to reduce mortgages to the actual value of the house rather than leave it at the value it was four years ago when the market was good.

Homeowners Associations in a bind

As the housing market fails to revive itself and homes remain vacant, homeowners associations are feeling the financial pinch. Homeowners are defaulting on their properties, leaving the association to pick up the bill said Eric Vifian of Bella Rose Homeowners Association in Sacramento.

“We’re upside down,” Vifian said about the homes in their association which were sold at their peak value and have since fallen to nearly half the price over the past few years.

“Most associations are not-for-profit organizations,” said Lisa, a manager at Wildwood Homeowners Association. “The money received from dues is put back into the community.”

Public records show that homeowners associations were first mandated in 1985 by the Davis-Stirling Act. The act requires that housing developments have homeowners associations to govern the community. This involves maintenance of roads, lighting, community pools, siding and landscaping in the neighborhood. The act also requires that certain regulations are met by the community and appropriate papers be filed according to California Civil Codes.

“If you are having trouble with paying dues, then you will be sent to collections and an attorney will contact you to make payment arrangements,” Lisa said. She said that the dues are not simply forgiven because homeowners are having a difficult time making their payments.

“People defaulting on their properties has put the association in terrible, terrible financial risk,” Vifian said. The association does not help homeowners with paying their dues because they don’t ask for help he said.

Vifian said that they offer homeowners a payment plan to ease their financial distress, but most of the time, they foreclose on their homes without seeking any sort of assistance from the association.

Lisa said that the bank-owned homes end up not paying the dues which causes financial strain on the association. The association can increase dues to the other homeowners to make up for the lost dues, but this is a rare case she said.

“The Davis-Stirling Act says do what you gotta do to make the association,” Lisa said.

“There is no help for the associations just like there is no assistance for homeowners,” said Vifian. He said that he fears for his job because the association is having trouble making its own bills.

Dr. Qayoumi blames Pakistan for Taliban

In a presentation at CSUS on October 28, 2010, Dr. Mohammad H. Qayoumi blamed Pakistan for sending over the Taliban and creating a religious fundamentalist society in Afghanistan. Qayoumi is the president of CSU-East Bay and has been back to Afghanistan since the ousting of the Taliban in 2001. He presented on the challenges that Afghanistan faces in the future with its economy. Qayoumi outlined a plan where Afghanistan can overcome its current corrupted government and start the road to recovery. However, he painted a very biased and offensive picture of how Afghanistan's destruction is the direct result of its neighboring countries. "The Taliban closed all the schools for women," he said. Although the west has donated a lot of money to rebuild these schools, it isn't enough he said. Qayoumi said that religion has always played a role in Afghanistan, but fundamentalism has not. "Pakistan brought in the Taliban," he exclaimed. I was completely shocked at his declaration. Later he gave more clarification to this opinion (and yes, this is his opinion, no facts were presented to support this). He said that Pakistan needed Afghanistan because the country is always at odds with neighboring India.

Qayoumi himself contradicted this idea by saying, "Afghanistan has been bringing in masons, carpenters and engineers from Pakistan for rebuilding the country." Why do they need to do that if Pakistan has an interest in destroying Afghanistan with religious fundamentalism.

Also, Pakistan closed their borders to Afghanistan in 1950. Taliban began its rule in the country in 1996. Again, the facts do not corroborate Qayoumi's opinion.

Pakistan's hatred of India has it scrambling for allies he explained. I thought this was completely absurd, given that Afghanistan does not have an established military, but has made do with guerrilla fighters all these years. Taliban, in essence, is these very fighters who have become fundamentalists in recent times. Specifically, the rise of the Islamic state in Afghanistan was inevitable given that all other governments had failed in the country. Let's not forget that the Taliban originated from "Pashtunistan," or the land of the Pashtuns. These were people that were in the northern part of the country and also spilled into Pakistan. After the cold war, the Pashtuns became the major ethnic group in Afghanistan. The Pashtuns in Afghanistan collaborated with those in Pakistan to try and free themselves from both countries. The result was sour relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan. The rise of the Taliban was fully supported by the local population of Afghanistan. They offered an alternative to the corrupt Mujaheddin system. People saw the Taliban's system as one based on Islamic values and moral standards. Why would they not have accepted it? But, unfortunately, like a dictator who cannot be stopped, the system went haywire - trapping the innocent Afghani population in an extremist religious ideology. Business Administration student Zeeshan Ayub said "I didn't like that he was blaming Pakistan for the Taliban." He said that both countries have a problem with terrorists. It was wrong for him to declare his bias in a room full of multi-ethnic students that included Pakistanis. "Its not written on their face of who is Taliban and who is an ordinary citizen in either country," Ayub said. Qayoumi is skeptical of progress made in Afghanistan while Karzai is president. He said that it has become evident that Karzai is corrupt. One can only hope that a new leader will rise in a country so ravaged by turmoil. One that is truly for the people.

How to Refinance Your Home

Today's unstable economy has led people to look for money saving alternatives. One of the biggest expenses is a home. Homeowners look to refinancing to ease monthly expenses.

There are two reasons why people refinance their homes. One is that they want to reduce debt, pay a lower rate of interest and lower their monthly mortgage payment. The other is to get equity from their home in a cash-out refinance which they can use elsewhere.

Becoming divorced or widowed will not change whether or not the bank will refinance your loan, unless your income level drops significantly. "The banks look at ratios of payment to income," says Stanford Mortgage's Loan Consultant Jeff Silver. The key is to be between 38-45% expense to income ratio. For example, if someone makes $2,000 a month, they should not have more than about $800 in debt including the mortgage payment.

The general rule of when to refinance is when the current interest rate is two or more points below the rate you pay now. However, you must also take into account that you will be paying closing costs and appraisal fees. The key is to calculate how much time it will take for you to break even. If it's less than a year, you are set to refinance.

The other condition of when you should refinance is when the value of your property is at a 80-20 ratio. This means that your loan amount should be 80% of the overall value of your property. This will save you from paying $75-150 extra in property mortgage insurance on top of your principal balance.

If homeowners want to refinance, they should prepare themselves financially to ensure a smooth transaction. The key is to pay off any debt that may hinder your ability to refinance. Pay off the credit cards or the remaining balance on your car or student loans.

Homeowners should also review their credit report and dispute any transactions that are incorrect. Sometimes something as simple as an error in the credit reporting can make the banks nervous.

Your mortgage payment history is the make or break of your refinance. If you can show that you have paid your mortgage payments on time without being late, you have won half the battle with the banks. However, if you are consistently late on your payments, you will have difficulties with the refinance process.

There are no real programs from the government that helps homeowners to refinance their homes. "Very little assistance trickles down to homeowners from the government," said Silver. Banks are not going to lower qualifications to approve loans for refinance.

There is one program that can help homeowners called Silent Second where the government provides equity to the buyer in the form of a second loan. A homeowner who can afford only a $70,000 loan will get an additional $30,000 to be repaid after the original 30-year loan is paid off. Then the homeowner will have another 30 years to pay off the government loan. "This is a popular loan for places like Roseville, Citrus Heights, Rocklin and other municipalities," said Silver.

FHA loans are the best for refinancing. They are assumable loans, so if the prior owner had a 4.5% interest rate with an FHA loan, as the new homeowner, you can also get that same rate. In refinancing, you would not have to prove your income status again for a FHA loan but rather just show that you have a job. Also you do not need to get an appraisal.

So if you are a homeowner looking to refinance - be sure to be in the best financial position you can be in. Shop around for the best rate and look at popular programs that give you advantages to pay off your loan.

Ammi (May Allah 'swt' give you Peace & Jannah)

standing still in the middle of my kitchen
gazing at the spot that was so used
the same place where you used to sit
and gaze back at me

here I stand, watching and waiting
I know the signals you are sending me
to say loudly what I feel
is when the words are wasted

I walk by your room every day
reminiscing the times we used to lie together
the murmurs in the night
the sadness in your life

your eyes closed, the pain gone
I am not suffering
that you have given me what was yours
for this is what I prayed for

mount of granite, an ever moving stream
the smile that is so clear to me
from a person so great
she was none other than my Ammi

The Pakistan Experience

After a 26-hour flight from California, any person would welcome land beneath their feet, unless it's land where there has been so much unrest. This country, to which I traveled recently, is Pakistan. It is my parents' native land where they still own property. The last time I was in Pakistan was ten years ago when the country was very different than it is now.

Upon arrival to Lahore's International Airport, I had a lot of anxiety. Having watched the turmoil unfolding on American media, I was afraid that we would be attacked just for being foreigners. Pakistan has been in the news consistently since the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center. The country's reputation, at least in America, is known to be a country that manufactures and promotes terrorism.

As we drove from Lahore to Faisalabad, our home city, there were signs throughout the cities of the turmoil in the country. The military has stationed snipers all over the cities, sitting behind barricades of sand bags on rooftops with their guns positioned in a way to quickly attack anyone that may cause unrest. The constant stopping of cars and questioning of the driver and passengers speaks of the Pakistanis' own fear of terrorism.

To anyone who grew up in America, the poverty is immediately apparent. I was reminded of this when several women approached me and asked for money to help feed their children. Soon, I realized that those that beg are not in the lowest classes of the country. Some of them make more money than the man that works a labor job of cleaning the streets all day with a jahrooh (hand-broom).

This is a country where the extremely rich cannot turn a blind eye to the poor, who often work for the wealthy. The poor live amongst the rich in houses built of mud bricks. There are homes built by wealthy Pakistanis that cost millions of rupees (the currency of Pakistan, one U.S. dollar is worth 84 rupees). Next door to these mansions will be a mud-brick hut with dirt floors that is inhabited by the less fortunate. These poor people live as nomads, moving from city to city to find work and settle down for a few months at a time.

In Pakistan, people believe everything can be reused. Many wealthy people who can afford cars unashamedly throw trash out of their car windows, only for it to be picked up by someone and reused. Technology seems ancient for this very reason. When asked why they don't upgrade, I was told, "Why? It still works!" This mentality reaches across the culture, from used clothing to plastic shopping bags, if there is some use left in an object, it will be used.

The purpose for my visit was to attend my niece's arranged marriage which turned out to be an interesting event. My niece and her husband were quite comfortable throughout the wedding ceremony despite the two not knowing each other beforehand. This was a three-day event. Unfortunately, the local police do not allow large gatherings to continue after midnight, so we were forced to move the festivities from the marriage hall to our home. This, I later found out, is another way the government of Pakistan ensures safety of its people.

The visit changed my view of Pakistan from many different angles. Although the country has its problems as every country does, the remarkable cultural fabric of the country makes up for what it lacks. Despite the problems, I share the hope that many youth have of Pakistan one day becoming a large economic power that is void of the corruption that infects it now.

Since my return to Sacramento, my friends and family have been asking me questions of my stay in Pakistan. During one such conversation, I was asked if Pakistan is a democracy. "Yes, it is," I said. "Really? Are the elections legitimate," he asked. "Are America's?" I said.